Thursday, February 12, 2015

TECH SPECIAL ..........................Tiny LEDs pave way to transparent gadgets

Tiny LEDs pave 
way to transparent
gadgets


Semi-transparent, flexible electronics are no longer just science-fiction
thanks to researchers who can now produce transparent LEDs at an
atomic level that are powered by grapheme

Published in the scientific journal Nature Materials, Univer sity of
Manchester and Uni versity of Sheffield researchers show that new
2D `designer materials' can be produced to create flexible, see-through
and more efficient electronic devices.
The team, led by Nobel Laureate Sir Kostya Novoselov, made the
breakthrough by creating LEDs which were engineered on an atomic level.
The new research shows that graphene and related 2D materials could be
utilised to create light emitting devices for the next-generation of mobile
phones, tablets and televisions to make them incredibly thin, flexible,
durable and even semi-transparent.
The LED device was constructed by combining different 2D crystals
and emits light from across its whole surface. Being so thin, at only
10-40 atoms thick, these new components can form the basis for the
first generation of semitransparent smart devices.
One-atom thick graphene was first isolated and explored in 2004 at
The University of Manchester. Its potential uses are vast but one of
the first areas in which products are likely to be seen is in electronics.
Other 2D materials, such as boron nitiride and molybdenum disulphide,
have since been discovered opening up vast new areas of research and
applications possibilities.
By building heterostructures ­ stacked layers of various 2D materials ­
to create bespoke functionality and introducing quantum wells to control
the movement of electrons, new possibilities for graphene based
optoelectronics have now been realised.
“As our new type of LED's only consist of a few atomic layers of
2D materials they are flexible and transparent. We envisage a new
generation of optoelectronic devices to stem from this work, from simple
transparent lighting and lasers and to more complex applications,“
said Freddie Withers, from the University of Manchester, who led
the production of the devices.
“By preparing the heterostructures on elastic and transparent substrates,
we show that they can provide the basis for flexible and semi-transparent
electronics,“ said explaining the creation of the LED device Sir Kostya
Novoselov.
“The range of functionalities for the demonstrated heterostructures is
expected to grow further on increasing the number of available 2D
crystals and improving their electronic quality.“
“The novel LED structures are robust and show no significant change
in performance over many weeks of measurements,“ added
Professor Alexander Tartakovskii, from The University of Sheffield.

MM4FEB15

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